Blast creative Social Media Marketing department has extensive experience in creating and maintaining your Social Networking Pages. We utilize strong marketing acumen to build effective campaigns that lead to solid conversions. We can assist you with SEO and PPC keyword research, web site optimization, social media, link building, marketing design review and creating marketing metric reports.

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Social Media Marketing is one of the most valuable tools for small to Medium size businesses. If you aren’t taking advantage of social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, then you could be losing sales, potential clients/customers.

Your business needs to be where the people are at and the people are on Facebook and Twitter. According to Mashable.com, Facebook is predicting that their 500 millionth member will join next week. That’s 500 million people that you have an opportunity to network with and market too!

Did you know that you can design your Facebook business page as well as your Twitter page to stay consistent with your brand? It’s true, you can run contests on Facebook, have an enewsletter signup, have an rss feed for your blog, have a shopping cart; the possibilities are endless!

If you are wanting to implement Social Media Marketing for your business, then contact Blast creative and Brenda Segna today! We can assist you with all of your marketing needs as well as design your Facebook and Twitter pages! Take your business to where the people are and let us help your business/network grow!

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Have you abandoned your poor website? Too embarrassed to even post it? Is it clothed in yesterday’s fashion? Neglected with broken links and outdated content? Do you have old-timey buttons that are gigantic, an antiquated link exchange or fancy scrolling text from the nineties?

(Headshake)

Have you been spending so much time on Facebook and YouTube that you forgot that your own website is the most important thing in your web marketing world? Have you run out of time to make the changes? Ignoring it’s helpless pleas for a make-over? Are you pretending everything is okay, when you know good and well something is wrong–very wrong with your tired old site that nobody cares about? The only person you’re not hurting is your competitors.

Do your clients and prospects a big favor. Stop lying to yourself, or hiding your head in the sand. Your website is a mere shadow of what it used to be, isn’t it? It’s not good enough for the new open web. It needs a fresh face and a new attitude–and it’s about time you do something about it.

(And don’t think your cousin’s uncle’s brother’s friend will do you any better on the website front either. You need help from an expert. A real expert who knows how to maneuver and position you in this new world of social media and the open web.)

Face it: Your website is tired, boring and old. It doesn’t do what you want it to do–not even close. You know deep in your heart that there are better ways to generate buzz on the web, but you’re afraid to invest (even a little) in technology. Why? You know in your heart that the web is the wave of the future. That 200 million people login to Facebook everyday. That fame is up-for-grabs. Why would you come to the party with an old teddybear of a website? Or wearing the same dress that over 1000 other girls have? Why? Why? Why?
Rotary Phones & 8-Track Tapes

When I was a little girl, rotary phones were still around, though many people migrated to the push-button kind. Remember? If not, think cassettes vs. CDs (though some of us remember records and 8-Tracks, but that’s not my point). What I am trying to say is that technology MOVES FORWARD and your website needs to stay ahead of the game, or at the least, neck-in-neck with the latest technology. Those old rotary phones took forever to dial just one number! The new buttons made life easier, gave us more time to live our lives and accomplish what we wanted. Likewise, there is new web technology available to you that can help you reach more people in less time and for less money. It can allow you to make your own edits, update the design in minutes, and share your thoughts with the entire planet with the click of a mouse.

If you only knew!

Believe me, I would rather not sell websites. I would rather coach, write and speak all day long. Unfortunately, my target market–small to medium business owners–do not hear the endless cries of their tired old websites. They just let the cries drone on, and on, and on–holding their noses to the foul smell. Therefore, I, a dedicated social media expert, must continue to sell, sell, sell newer, faster, better small to medium business websites that get the job done like no cheap template ever would or could. (I’m trying to make the world a better place..)
Old, Cheap Websites Are Bad for You!

Every time I talk with a potential coaching or consulting client, I first ask to see their website. Much to my chagrin, the sites are always old, boring, tired, feeble and practically useless. It is so sad to see their poor, neglected sites shivering in the cold, in dire need of warmth and TLC. I just want to run over, pick it up, squeeze it and give it a thousand kisses. I ache to bring those poor useless websites back to life by introducing them back to civilization, Facebook, Twitter, Google Buzz, YouTube. Heart wrenching.

Can’t You See? Your Website Needs You!

Your website is crying, begging and pleading to be brought up-to-date with the new decade. It needs a little TLC. There are so many ways you could help it. So many things you can do that require very little from you. New technology is making new tools affordable like content management system, search engine optimization, editable pages, lead capture forms and IDX search. Nowadays you can get a site that’s built with open source code that makes changing the design as easy-as-changing an iPhone case. It’s terribly disconcerting that all this amazing technology is at your fingertips and you’re not using it to make your life easier. Too bad, website so sad.

Your website is the core of all your social media activities. When you’re online having a blast like 200 gazillion other people (including your target market), you could have something worth showing off–if only you’d invest a little time and money to make your website as brilliant as you are. If only. If only you’d see the value in having a website that’s integrated with social media, search engine optimized and totally editable by you. If only.

Pobrecito!

Just a few years ago, your website was fine and dandy. It was merely a place to hold information. Any website would do–you didn’t need an expensive contraption. You could build your own site at GoDaddy, or pay $49 per month to Advanced Access. You didn’t need to pay more, because cheap template sites would get the job done. Not any more.If you want to experience top-level success on the web using social media, you will need to get a new website that’s inline with new open web technology. Your new site needs to be clothed in original couture, unique and branded to match your target market. Put your lonely website to work! It is dying to feel useful. She could be a work-horse, if you let her. A central repository (so-to-speak) of all your web content. If social media sites are like mingling at a party, your website is like bringing good friends to your hacienda. Your website is the focal point, your place on the web where everything stems, and everything flows. Don’t embarrass yourself with an unkempt web house. (Not with me around!)

You new, popular, fulfilled website can do what your worn-out, used one never could. Here’s what I’m thinking:

1. Brand your business.
2. Provide information to clients, prospects, industry & media.
3. Offer tools for prospects to use.
4. Contain your blog.
5. Contain all web content to be distributed through social media.
6. Convert prospects with lead capture tools.
7. Tell prospects about all social media activity.
8. Automatically update to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Others.
9. Allow your visitors to Tweet your posts and share them on other sites on the open web.
10. Provide a place for visitors to comment and engage with content.
11. Optimized for search engine rankings.
12. Integrated with Google for immediate indexing in the cache via direct RSS feed.
13. User friendly layout with search feature.

Sounds like a lot, doesn’t it? Well it is. Just a few short years ago, you couldn’t get these features for a reasonably priced website. Today, all that has changed. My company, BLaST creative can help turn your old site into a beauty queen with endorsement offers. ;-)

And That’s Not All!

Your website deserves to have the best there is, so we’ve spared nothing to bring you even more attributes to make your site the best–and to help you show it off with pride in social circles.

Having an updated website that feels good about herself will pay dividends well beyond the web. You will be more proud of your online look, and more likely to share her with others. You will begin to see an increase in notoriety and fame among your target market, as your new, improved, advanced, beautiful semi-custom website will sparkle, shine and do the work of ten horses for you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year–around the planet–for infinity.

Give the girl a break. Get an update today! Together, we’ll create a client-magnet.

Monday, February 15, 2010

On page optimization and link building are the most basic techniques of optimizing a website. Apart from web pages, many sites contain assets in the form of documents (.doc, .pdf), spreadsheets (.xls), presentations and videos (.avi etc). Optimizing these assets is beneficial as they get indexed faster and rank well in the top search engine result pages.

1. Use a Text Based PDF Creator: There are a lot free tools available online with Adobe Acrobat being the best text based PDF creator. If a PDF document is created in an image based program, the search engines will completely ignore it. If the PDF is created using a text based creator like Adobe acrobat, the search engine robots will read and index the text like any other web page.

2. Update the Document Title: The title of the PDF file is as important as the title tag of a web page. The PDF title property tells the search engine robots about the type of content. The most important aspect of the title is that Google uses the text in the title field as the link in the search engine result pages. Thus, the title field should be keyword rich and should not contain random text.

3. Complete the document properties: A PDF file contains many document properties apart from the title field. These are keywords, description, author info, copyright info etc. All the fields must be completed with relevant information. The keyword field should not be stuffed with keywords or remain empty. It has not been proven that the search engines give importance to the keyword field in the document properties. If in future they do, your PDF file will have an advantage over other web pages.

4. Link to the PDF File from the Homepage: The Searchbots will not discover and index the PDF file if it is placed too deep within the website. To ensure that the PDF file gets crawled by the search engines, it should be visibly linked from the home page or any other page which gets crawled regularly. If your aim is to get the PDF in top search engine result pages, then you have to lead the searchbots to it.

5. Optimize the content in the PDF File: The content in the text based PDF files is similar to the content in a website. This makes content optimization an important aspect in optimization of PDF files. The content should be relevant to the subject matter. Important text should be highlighted by increasing their font size and utilizing the bold and italics features of the PDF files. Keywords should be placed in the first few lines of the content.

6. Place Links in the PDF File: When a visitor opens a PDF file ranking in the top search engine results page, there should be a provision in the file to link back to its original website. This action reduces the efforts of the visitor to hunt for the main website. Also, a link from the PDF file can be considered as a backlink by the search engine.

Friday, January 8, 2010

Okay, so you already know that you want/need a website, but what you aren’t sure of is web hosting! If you need web hosting, go to GoDaddy and not a redistrubitor of GoDaddy, but GoDaddy.com!

I promise you that you and your web designer may be best friends today! But I can guarantee you that somewhere down the road you will part ways. That is when the waters start to get murky! Well whose site is it anyway. Let me make myself very clear here-IT’S YOURS! You paid for it, it’s your site, but some of the designers that have you host with them think that if you are no longer their client they can take your site hostage.

Not only is this site hostage situation unprofessional, it’s illegal! It’s YOUR SITE! And people who redistribute-which means that GoDaddy lets designers like myself resell their hosting packages. Not only do these designers charge you significantly more than if you were to go to GoDaddy directly and purchase the package yourself, but you also have to go through their link to access your site.

So if this designer changes sites or moves on to another business, you now have to search for your hosting and where to log-in. BIG HEADACHE! So go to the web hosting site of YOUR choice and I do prefer GoDaddy.com! Purchase the package yourself, then contact a designer. Stay ahead of the game and save yourself a few headaches!